F/X Pushes Butler's Game to '09 (Blog)

The upcoming SF film Game, starring Gerard Butler, is being delayed to the summer of 2009 to complete visual-effects work, producer Gary Lucchesi told reporters.

Lucchesi expects to announce a new release date soon, he added in a group interview this week in Beverly Hills, Calif., where he was promoting Henry Poole Is Here.

Game, from writer/directors Mark Neveldine and Brian Taylor (Crank), is the story of a futuristic video game in which players control actual human beings, including Butler's Kabel.

Creating the video-game world poses visual-effects challenges. "Game is a 'sim-world' movie, so you have a young kid who is controlling an avatar," Lucchesi said. "There are lots of visual effects."

Neveldine and Taylor will push visual boundaries, as they have done with their practical camerawork, Lucchesi added. "They came out of commercials and out of doing second unit," he said. "Mark Neveldine was a hockey player, which made him really good on roller blades. So he'd pick up these cameras, and he'd go down the street with the roller blades, and somebody would be pulling him on a motorcycle, and he'd be getting these wild and crazy shots, so they are visually aggressive. That's what they are."

With a release date still pending, Lucchesi expected to reveal finished footage in the form of a teaser trailer. "I think soon," he said. "Christmas, I would think."

Neveldine and Taylor's upcoming sequel, Crank 2: High Voltage, will come out in April 2009, even though it was shot after Game. --Fred Topel